Fort Bragg foster father accused of baby's death in court

The foster father accused of beating a 5-month-old baby girl to death in December while she was in his care was in Mendocino County Superior Court Wednesday to schedule a March preliminary hearing.

Wilson L. Tubbs III, 38, faces a charge of child abuse resulting in death, which carries the same weight as murder, according to the Mendocino County District Attorney's Office.

During a preliminary hearing, the district attorney makes a case before a judge to show that the defendant should be bound over for trial for the crime charged. Tubbs is due in court for his preliminary hearing March 20.

His attorney, Public Defender Linda Thompson, requested the date despite being "very uncomfortable" because she still did not have the baby's autopsy report. No autopsy report was available in mid-January when Tubbs last appeared in court, Assistant District Attorney Paul Sequeira, who is prosecuting the case, reported at the time.

Thompson asked the court last month to continue the proceedings while she waited for the report and prepared her case.

Thompson told the court at the time that the preliminary hearing might take more than a day because she planned to make her own case in Tubbs' defense, possibly putting on medical evidence and calling her own witnesses.

Tubbs had on Dec. 2 brought the baby girl, who had months earlier been taken from her mother, to the Mendocino Coast District Hospital not breathing and blue, and with bruises on her face and head.

Tubbs, the girl's foster father, initially claimed the infant was injured when she fell from a changing bench onto a hardwood floor in his house, and later admitted he slapped and violently shook the baby, the Fort Bragg Police Department reported previously.

The baby girl was flown to Oakland Children's Hospital, where she was pronounced dead Dec. 4. Tubbs was arrested Dec. 10 on suspicion of child abuse resulting in death.

Tiffany Revelle can be reached at udjtr@ukiahdj.com, on Twitter @TiffanyRevelle or at 468-3523.